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Big Money In This Fish Story


mrmoshe

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Big money in this fish story

(October 22, 2006) — Fishing used to be an escape. The thing people left work to go do.

Now some — a lucky few perhaps — have made fishing their business.

"I look at it more for the competition," says Ken Strimple, 37, of Fairport, who is on the ESPN Bassmaster Northern Tour, a tournament trail that leads to the Super Bowl of bass fishing — the $2 million CITGO Bassmaster Classic. Strimple is close to qualifying for that ESPN2-televised event.

"It's not just going out fishing. I know this is what I need to do to be successful."

Kevin Bishop, 39, of Hilton has fished competitively for bass since the early 1990s, back when the game was considered to be more contemplative than competitive, according to Bass Madness author and Field & Stream fishing authority Ken Schultz.

Now, Bishop says, bass fishing is "huge."

"The last five years, it's gotten so much more money in it, it's unbelievable," says Bishop, who competes on the Stren Series, which — despite being the Triple-A level of the Wal-Mart FLW Tour — will have anglers competing for $1 million at the season-ending championship Nov. 1 to 4. Bishop, who was second in the Angler-of-the-Year race, will fish for the $140,000 first prize.

"They brought so many big-name companies that have nothing to do with fishing. It's like NASCAR.

"What it's done is make it a viable option as a career. You can make a good, good living doing it."

Hooked on B.A.S.S.

Strimple made the plunge into the big-time, big-money world of bass fishing this year. He and his wife, Lori, had talked about his trying his hand at pro fishing for a few years. "I contacted B.A.S.S. and asked, 'What do you recommend that I do?'" Strimple says. "They suggested, 'Try it as a co-angler to see how you do and if you can handle it.'"

As the co-angler, Strimple is at the mercy of the boater he draws each day during the five three-day tournaments on the tour.

"One boater might be a great fisherman and the next one might be terrible," he says. "You never know who you're going to be fishing with or what style they'll be fishing.

"If I was a boater, I'd go out and fish to my strength. As the non-boater, I'm at the mercy of where they want to go. If that's not my strength, I better figure out how to make it my strength."

That's what Strimple did after his B.A.S.S. tournament debut in June on Kentucky Lake in Kentucky Dam Village, Ky.

"On day one I didn't do as well as I had hoped, but I outfished my boater," he says, recalling how he brought one bass to the weigh-in. "The second day, I was with a boater who spent the day fishing the weeds."

Strimple did not catch any keepers, and placed 92nd. (The top 50 advance to the money round — the third round.)

"I came home and practiced in my back yard," says Strimple, who has three children. "The next tournament was on the Mississippi River. I practiced for the Mississippi on the Erie Canal."

He worked the weeds along the canal until he felt prepared for whatever awaited.

"I missed the cut by 14 ounces in my second pro tournament," says Strimple, who was 58th.

He followed those first two events with a pair of top-50 finishes: 48th on Lake Champlain in August and 19th on Lake Erie in Sandusky, Ohio, two weeks ago. That puts him in 23rd place in the tour standings going into the season finale Thursday on Smith Mountain Lake in Virginia.

If he leaves Smith Mountain Lake still among the top 30, he will qualify for the 2007 Classic in February in Alabama.

Catching the fever

Schultz, author of Bass Madness: Bigmouths, Big Money, and Big Dreams at the Bassmaster Classic (Wiley, $24.95), covered the 2005 and 2006 Classics for his book. He writes that he "could not relate to competitive fishing because competition is not what drew me to sport fishing or fed my passion for catching fish."

But Bishop, a high school wrestling star at Greece Athena, found competitive fishing a match made in angling heaven.

"Fishing was the favorite thing I've ever done," he says. "In high school, you wrote that I liked fishing more than I liked wrestling."

He confirms now that I was correct then.

"Competition put together with the fishing was perfect for me," Bishop says.

Still, he keeps his perspective.

"For me, because of my family and business, (fishing professionally full-time) would take too much time," says Bishop, who is married to wife Valerie, has a 10-year-old daughter, Courtney, and owns New York State Painting. "My long-term goal is to work my way up to that level and still have everything else working.

"I don't want to travel all the time. I want to be with my wife and watch my daughter growing up. I don't want to lose my painting company."

But even fishing in the sport's Triple-A can pay. Bishop refers to it as "supplemental income."

Bishop had 22nd-, 7th-, 25th- and 9th-place finishes in four Northeast Division events to collect $13,150. It was his best season in four years in the Stren Series. Dave LeFebre, a Pennsylvanian who has won more than $500,000 on the bass circuit, was the only angler to finish ahead of Bishop in the series standings.

The Stren Series is part of FLW Outdoors, which is owned by Wal-Mart and is the largest competitive tournament organization in the world (surpassing the ESPN-owned B.A.S.S.). There are three levels of tournaments in the FLW, starting with the Bass Fishing League, moving up to Stren, and then culminating in the FLW Tour and FLW Series.

To qualify for the FLW Tour and Series, an angler needs to finish among the top 10 in the Stren Series. Bishop, who was 11th in 2004 and 15th in 2003, will fish FLW Tour and Series events next year.

But he won't give up his day job. Nor will Strimple, who is a senior salesman at John Holtz Honda and so far has won only $622 from B.A.S.S.

Gone fishin'

Both men say they would be out fishing whether or not there were promising paydays on the horizon.

"The last two winters, because it's been so mild, we've fished every month," says Bishop, who keeps his boat ready to go in his garage.

Says Strimple: "I fish like most people golf. I'm out every day before work."

He fly fishes streams until lake fishing heats up. In the fall, he greets the salmon and steelhead runs. But his eye is still out for bass.

"The best time for bass is in the fall and spring," Strimple says. "In Virginia, it'll be fall conditions. It's fall fishing for me."

Before going into work or going about the business of tournament bass fishing.

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